Travel has recently become the world’s largest industry, exceeding a trillion-dollar annual footprint. This means that travelers have real power. Where we choose to put our footprints has real economic and political significance. Ethical Traveler believes that mindful travel offers many rewards, both personal and global. By “voting with our wings” — choosing our destinations well and remembering our roles as citizen diplomats — we create international goodwill and help change the world for the better.

Every year, Ethical Traveler reviews the policies and practices of scores of nations in the developing world. We then select the ten that are doing the most impressive job of promoting human rights, preserving their environments, and supporting social welfare – all while creating a lively, community-based tourism industry. By visiting these countries, we use our economic leverage as travelers to support best practices.

We urge you to explore these destinations, and to enjoy the wonderful sights, cultures and inspirations they offer.

Though our very best efforts go into creating this list, we must continually remind ourselves: No country is perfect. All nations have genuine shortcomings. Each of our winners, however, had made a genuine effort to “do the right thing” in the many areas that we take into consideration.

Ethical Traveler is an all-volunteer, non-profit organization, and a project of the Earth Island Institute. No money or donations of any kind are solicited or accepted from any nations, governments, travel bureaus or individuals in the creation of our annual list.

The Winners
Ethical Traveler congratulates the countries on our 2014 list of The World’s 10 Best Ethical Destinations. The winners, in alphabetical order (not in order of merit), are:

• The Bahamas
• Barbados *
• Cape Verde*
• Chile
• Dominica
• Latvia *
• Lithuania *
• Mauritius *
• Palau *
• Uruguay *

( * = also appeared on our 2013 list)

This is an excerpt from Ethical Traveler as it appeared on December 11, 2013. For updates or to read the current version of this post in its entirety, please click here.

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